Gaza Israel Quotes & Sayings

I think Israel will think one thousands times before invading Gaza. — Ahmed Yassin

Israel will not and should not leave until it is clear that the West Bank can be policed by Palestinians and that the region will not be a source of terrorism against Israel, as Gaza and South Lebanon became when Israel left there. — Elliott Abrams

One wonders what exactly Israel did to earn Arab enmity between 1948 and 1967, when Egypt controlled the Gaza Strip and Jordan controlled Judea and Samaria. — Ben Shapiro

Gaza is such a tremendous humanitarian problem, it's way beyond Israel's capability to do anything significant about. It's a world problem, but the world doesn't want to do anything about it. That the world has packed them like sardines in a tiny piece of territory run by a fanatic Islamic group, run by a fanatic group like Hamas. Unless the world decides it wants to tackle this problem, that they want to deal with refugees there, prepare to absorb some of the refugees. — Moshe Arens

I wrote that President Bush is passing on to President-elect Obama two wars and an economic debacle. I call it a depression. And he is arming Israel against the Palestinians in every way in Gaza. — Helen Thomas

The border between the State of Israel and the occupied Gaza Strip had always reminded him of the line between Tijuana and greater San Diego. There, too, ragged men the color of earth waited with the mystical patience of the very poor on the pleasure of crisply uniformed, well-nourished officials. Some months before, Lucas had come down for the dawn shape-up at the checkpoint, and he had not forgotten the drawn faces in the half-light, the terrible smiles of the weak, straining to make themselves agreeable to the strong. — Robert Stone

Every week 10,000 tons of food, medicine, and other humanitarian supplies are sent by Israel to Gaza. — Charles Krauthammer

The goal of the operation is to send Gaza back to the Middle Ages, only then will Israel be calm for the next 40 years. — Michael Ben-Ari

But when Warren has spoken on national security, she has invariably spouted warmed-over, banal Democratic hawk tripe of the kind that she just recited about Israel and Gaza. During her Senate campaign, for instance, she issued wildly militaristic - and in some cases clearly false - statements about Iran and its nuclear program that would have been comfortable on the pages of The Weekly Standard. — Glenn Greenwald

Based on the Gaza precedent, Israel should not simply be expected to withdraw from territory and let it devolve into a state of anarchy. The West Bank is simply too close to Israel's major population centers and infrastructure to allow it to become another launching pad for rockets. — Edgar Bronfman, Sr.

Israel is the number one rogue state threat to Middle Eastern peace with its nuclear arms and acts of outright aggression towards its peaceful neighbours Syria and Lebanon - and genocidal actions against the marginalised Palestinians of the West Bank - and Gaza in particular. — Mohamed ElBaradei

Israel will not transfer Judea, Samaria, and the Gaza District to any foreign sovereign authority, [because] of the historic right of our nation to this land, [and] the needs of our national security, which demand a capability to defend our State and the lives of our citizens. — Menachem Begin

We do not build new Jewish communities in Samaria, Judea and Gaza. The United States has never accepted our building of communities or of the fence. Yet, I've managed to develop relations between Israel and the United States even though President Bush never supported settlements. — Ariel Sharon

The Oslo Accords in 1993 determined that the Gaza Strip and the West Bank are a single territorial entity which cannot be divided. Immediately, the United States and Israel set about separating the two and making sure that they would not be united. — Noam Chomsky

As the current U.S.-Israel assault raged, New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman explained that Israel's tactics in the current attack, as in its invasion of Lebanon in 2006, are based on the sound principle of "trying to 'educate' Hamas, by inflicting a heavy death toll on Hamas militants and heavy pain on the Gaza population." That makes sense on pragmatic grounds, as it did in Lebanon, where "the only long-term source of deterrence was to exact enough pain on the civilians - the families and employers of the militants - to restrain Hezbollah in the future."10 And by similar logic, bin Laden's effort to "educate" Americans on 9/11 was highly praiseworthy, as were the Nazi attacks on Lidice and Oradour, Putin's destruction of Grozny, and other notable educational exercises. — Noam Chomsky

I saw no evidence during my week in Gaza of Israel's accusation that Hamas uses Palestinians as human shields. — Jeremy Bowen

Each time there is a conflict between Israel and Gaza, accusations fly over who started it, each side blaming the other. — Richard Engel

Some geopolitical conflicts are morally complicated. The Israel-Gaza war is not. It possesses a moral clarity not only rare but excruciating. [ ... ] For Hamas, the only thing more prized than dead Jews are dead Palestinians. — Charles Krauthammer

Anyone who is portraying Israel as a friend is a servant of Israel.
I warn some sides against turning enemies into friends and friends into enemies.
Some in the Arab world try to present "Israel" as a friend and Iran as a foe.
Yet such conspiracies will fail. "Israel" has not been helping because of its hostile and aggressive nature. The Arab world is realising day after day that Iran is a friend, which was highlighted in Iran's support to Gaza and Lebanon. — Hassan Nasrallah

Gaza will become part of sovereign Israel and will be populated by Jews. This will also serve to ease the housing crisis in Israel — Moshe Feiglin

Israel attacked Gaza solely in response to hundreds of rockets sent by Hamas to kill as many Israelis as possible. — Dennis Prager

Where were the calls for a no-fly zone when Israel attacked Gaza — George Galloway

The one thing that I'm absolutely sure about is that the people of Gaza aren't going anywhere. And neither are the people of Israel. — Ross Kemp

Playing on the streets of Iraq, or in Israel or the Gaza strip, I'd sing angry protest songs against war. People would say, 'Make us clap, make us dance, and laugh and sing.' It really made me think about the importance of happy music. — Michael Franti

The militarization of the police leads us to think about Israel and the militarization of the police there - if only the images of the police and not of the demonstrators had been shown, one might have assumed that Ferguson was Gaza. I think that it is important to recognize the extent to which, in the aftermath of the advent of the war on terror, police departments all over the US have been equipped with the means to allegedly "fight terror. — Angela Y. Davis

Those [American Jews] who favor the [Israeli] attack on Gaza are certainly guilty of such overwhelming emotional and cultural attachment to Israel and Israelis, that they long ago ceased viewing this conflict with any remnant of objectivity. — Glenn Greenwald

From the U.S. point of view, negotiations are, in effect, a way for Israel to continue its policies of systematically taking over whatever it wants in the West Bank, maintaining the brutal siege on Gaza, separating Gaza from the West Bank and, of course, occupying the Syrian Golan heights, all with full U.S. support. — Noam Chomsky

Gaza 1948: Gaza was not a refugee camp yet, just a place designated for Palestinian people when the state of Israel came begin. But day by day it filled up with people who had no place else to go to. — Izzeldin Abuelaish

Those who threaten Israel threaten us. Israel has always faced these threats on the frontlines, and I will bring to the White House an unshakable commitment to Israel's security. That starts with insuring Israel's qualitative military advantage. I will insure that Israel can defend itself from any threat, from Gaza to Tehran. — Barack Obama

The new crimes that the US and Israel were committing in Gaza as 2009 opened do not fit easily into any standard category - except for the category of familiarity. — Noam Chomsky

But I'll tell you the truth: The world needs more peacemaker instead of warmonger. — Kristian Goldmund Aumann

During my travels in Iraq, Israel, Gaza, Brazil, Indonesia, Japan, Europe and all over the United States, I have seen and heard the voices of people who want change. They want the stabilization of the economy, education and healthcare for all, renewable energy and an environmental vision with an eye on generations to come. — Michael Franti

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie is going to Israel. He's going to be pretty disappointed when he finds out the Gaza Strip isn't a steak. — Jimmy Fallon

The people of Gaza are trapped. Israel has sealed the border, and they have no way to leave the Gaza Strip to do business. — Richard Engel

[Israel will] create in the course of the next 10 or 20 years conditions which would attract natural and voluntary migration of the refugees from the Gaza Strip and the west Bank to Jordan. To achieve this we have to come to agreement with King Hussein and not with Yasser Arafat. — Yitzhak Rabin

Hamas thinks they can kill the will of people by intimidation. Most of those who are killed in the Gaza Strip for the suspicion of collaborating with Israel, have nothing to do with Israel. — Mosab Hassan Yousef

I don't think that Israel has any legal or moral justification for their massive bombing of the entire nation of Lebanon. What happened is that Israel is holding almost 10,000 prisoners, so when the militants in Lebanon or in Gaza take one or two soldiers, Israel looks upon this as a justification for an attack on the civilian population of Lebanon and Gaza. I do not think that's justified, no. — Jimmy Carter

The actions of the terrorist organizations, Hezbollah, in Lebanon, and Hamas, in Gaza, against Israel are unconscionable. Instead of working towards peace, these terrorist organizations have chosen to perpetuate the violence. — Alcee Hastings

Israel has to accommodate the Palestinian demands and aspirations for ending occupation and the establishment of an independent Palestinian state. That is the only answer. The Israeli aggression on Gaza does not bring peace to Israel. We know that. We want end of occupation. — Benjamin Netanyahu

We can never totally return to the indefensible pre-1967 borders, ... We simply cannot afford to make Israel 14.48 km (9 miles) wide again at its center. We can't allow the Palestinians to be a couple of [miles] from [Tel Aviv's] Ben-Gurion Airport in the age of shoulder-fire missiles with the capacity to shoot down jumbo jets. But that doesn't mean we must remain in every corner of the West Bank or in Gaza, where fewer than 10,000 Jews, living next to 1.3 million Palestinians, have been protected by twice as many soldiers. — Ehud Olmert

The truce brokered by Egypt between Israel and Hamas depends, above all, on the borders between Egypt, Gaza and Israel. — Elliott Abrams

If the Palestinian people really wish to decide that they will battle to the very end to prevent partition or annexation of even an inch of their ancestral soil, then I have to concede that that is their right. I even think that a sixty-year rather botched experiment in marginal quasi-statehood is something that the Jewish people could consider abandoning. It represents barely an instant in our drawn-out and arduous history, and it's already been agreed even by the heirs of Ze'ev Jabotinsky that the whole scheme is unrealizable in 'Judaea and Samaria,' let alone in Gaza or Sinai. But it's flat-out intolerable to be solicited to endorse a side-by-side Palestinian homeland and then to discover that there are sinuous two-faced apologists explaining away the suicide-murder of Jewish civilians in Tel Aviv, a city which would be part of a Jewish state or community under any conceivable 'solution.' There's that word again ... — Christopher Hitchens

There are no innocents in Gaza, don't let any diplomats who want to look good in the world endanger your lives - mow them down! — Michael Ben-Ari

He [Erdogan] has crept up to the edge talking about mistakes by pilots. But he also knows that with leaders like himself and Vladimir Putin, apologies may not be the answer. Just look at Israel. Prime Minister Netanyahu apologized years ago to Erdogan over this incident off the coast of Gaza in which Turkish people died onboard an aid ship. And only just now is that relationship at least in talks to be improved. — Peter Kenyon

I would like Israel to be a Jewish state, and therefore not to annex over 2 million Palestinians who live in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip to Israel, which will make Israel a bi-national state. — Yitzhak Rabin

It is human nature to seek revenge in the face of relentless suffering. You can't expect an unhealthy person to think logically. — Izzeldin Abuelaish

When Israel gave Gaza over to the Palestinians, it did not embargo essentials such as cement. But none of the millions of tons of cement allowed, or later smuggled, into Gaza were used to building schools or hospitals. They were used to build tunnels to smuggle terrorists into Israel and to hide rockets. — Dennis Prager

They are going to leave [Gaza], not because this is a gift from Israel. This is because they failed to confront our people, so don't describe their withdrawal from here ... as a gift for the Palestinians. This is because they are defeated here. HAMAS will never recognize the existence of a Jewish State in the region. — Zuheir Mohsen

Israel's days without Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria and the Gaza Strip are gone and will not return. — Yitzhak Shamir

Crimes against humanity in Gaza: is it really a 'buffer zone' - or a bigger plan?
It's time to step back and ask if we want to support Israel if it wants to eject all Palestinians from their land. — Dennis Kucinich

Half the published articles on Gaza contain a standard reference to its resemblance to a vast open-air prison (and when I last saw it under Israeli occupation it certainly did deserve this metaphor). The problem is that, given its ideology and its allies, Hamas qualifies rather too well in the capacity of guard and warder. — Christopher Hitchens

Two years ago, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon described the Gaza Strip settlement of Netzarim as a vital part of Israel's national security and now he is going to leave. That is because of the 'effective armed struggle'. — Zuheir Mohsen

But not all Gaza residents were committed to the war. A reporter asked one of the Arabs what he most wanted. He was a taxi driver, father of ten. All he wanted was 'to eat and to work.' What did he think of Nasser? 'Nasser is good, Israel is good, America is good, Britain is good, Canada is good, India is good, Anything is good. — Robert John Donovan

I believe that if Israel were to put an end to the settlements in the West Bank tomorrow, as it did in Gaza, there would still be reluctance on the part of the Palestinian Authority to recognize Israel's right to exist as a Jewish secular democracy. — Alan Dershowitz

If in the past, you didnt cry out when thousands of protestors were killed and injured by Turkey, Egypt and Libya, when more victims than ever were hanged by Iran, women and children in Afghanistan were bombed, whole communities were massacred in South Sudan, 1800 Palestinians were starved and murdered by Assad in Syria, hundreds in Pakistan were killed by jihadist terrorist attacks, 10,000 Iraqis were killed by terrorists, villagers were slaughtered in Nigeria, but you ONLY cry out for Gaza, then you are NOT Pro- Human Rights, you are only Anti-Israel. — Hillel Neuer

Hamas is regularly described as 'Iranian-backed Hamas, which is dedicated to the destruction of Israel.' One will be hard put to find something like 'democratically elected Hamas, which has long been calling for a two-state settlement in accord with the international consensus' - blocked for over 30 years by the US and Israel. All true, but not a useful contribution to the Party Line, hence dispensable. — Noam Chomsky

It cannot be too often stressed that Israel had no credible pretext for its 2008-9 attack on Gaza, with full U.S. support and illegally using U.S. weapons. — Noam Chomsky

But blaming Islam is a simple answer, easier and less controversial than re-examining the core political issues and grievances that resonate in much of the Muslim world: the failures of many Muslim governments and societies, some aspects of U.S. foreign policy representing intervention and dominance, Western support for authoritarian regimes, the invasion and occupation of Iraq, or support for Israel's military battles with Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon. (p. 136-137) — John L. Esposito

The PLO was founded three years before the Israelis ever occupied Gaza and the West Bank, and that the PLO wanted Israel wiped off the map. But in a ninety-second story, who has time to remind viewers that when the PLO was founded, Gaza was illegally occupied by Egypt, and the West Bank by Jordan, but Yasser Arafat did not mind those occupations? Where were the voices of the Palestinians then for their independent state? — Brigitte Gabriel

Take a young man from Gaza living in the most horrendous conditions - most of it imposed by Israel - who straps dynamite around himself and then throws himself into a crowd of Israelis. I've never condoned or agreed with it, but at least it is understandable as the desperate wish of a human being who feels himself being crowded out of life and all of his surroundings, who sees his fellow citizens, other Palestinians, his parents, sisters, and brothers, suffering, being injured, or being killed. He wants to do something, to strike back. — Edward Said